CB
by LilyClayton
Summary: The thing with her is that you never know if she's listening or not, if she's asleep or awake, happy or sad, day or night, usually she's is in the middle. You could see her walk through the room, never knowing where she's going, floating, flying, away. This is Cassiopeia Black.
1. Chapter 1

**So, just saying before you start, the gramma and spelling is HORRIBLE! I'm dyslectic AND Dutch so that I'm doing this is a quiet a thing on it's own... ENJOY!**

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The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.

-Edmund Burke

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What if there was a girl from Slythering, a girl every one forgot to think about after she was dropped of at her father's descent cousin, Corvus Greengrass. A young girl with so much potential yet people just has the habit to overlook.

Cassiopeia put the paper down feeling a lump in her throat; with all her might she pushed it away. Cassiopeia never cried, never showed emotion, she had inherited that from her mother. Again, she read the headline;

**MASS BREAKOUT FROM AZKABAN MINISTRY FEARS BLACK IS 'RALLYING POINT' FOR OLD DEATH EATERS.**

With all her might she tried not to look at the photos, but of course she didn't succeed. Rodolphus Lestrange looked thick in the photo, his eyes blank, face hollow, hair unkempt, dirty, suddenly Cassiopeia wanted her father to be here to tell she had nothing to fear about. Not that she had ever met her father, Merlin no; he was taken to Azkaban three weeks after she was born, but when she was a child she always thought of him as the perfect father. Now, when she was older and less naïve, Cassiopeia knows she will probably never have a real family, but still, sometimes, when she feels sad, Cassiopeia dreams about her mother and father, and how life would have been if they weren't in Azkaban.

'Hey Cass,' someone said next to her, she looked up. Draco sat next to her smiling; she gave him a small smile to show that she noticed him and turned back to her peach yoghurt with fresh pieces of peach. No skin.

'You should try orange yoghurt with slices of orange, mother makes it and it's delicious,' Draco told her, Cassiopeia gave him a small nod and said; 'I'll give it a try,'

'Good,' we ate the rest of our breakfast in silence.

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'Can anyone recall how to use a transforming spell when performing Cross-Species Switching? No? Okay, let's see, Miss Black,' slowly Cassiopeia turned her face from the window she was looking out, to McGonagall, in a bored voice she said,

'The right way to switch between two species, but only when they are animals, is to use the indication; _transibit transpire_, together with the movement used for switching spells on unanimated objects,' All the Hufflepuff kids looked in aw at her, even after two years of sharing the subject they still cant get over the point that Cassiopeia isn't in Ravenclaw. They will know when the Dark Lord takes over and all they're useless family's will be dead and they them self will be in Azkaban because of muggle cooperation. But now she was just going to endure it. While our lovely transfiguration teacher drones on about switching spell and how to use them correctly, Cassiopeia thought about this summer, when her aunt Narcissa summoned her to there manor telling her about what had happened in the graveyard that summer. Cassiopeia was never one to talk but that day she had spoke more than she had in her whole life. They told Draco the same day when they gave her the 'announcement'; he was shocked that Cassiopeia could even talk that much. Every one always thought Cassiopeia had PTSD after hearing that her parents where in Azkaban. But she wasn't in shock, Cassiopeia wasn't depressed, she just didn't have the need to fill every silence with mindless chatter, or any chatter at all. '… Homework is on the blackboard, its due on Tuesday. So make sure you finish it this time Scerbo,' she added sternly to one of the Hufflepuffs, who blushed scarlet and launched into a story why he hasn't finished his homework. _Probably eaten by his pet dragon_, Cassiopeia thought snickering then she told herself; _it wasn't even that funny_ she argued, and then she agreed with herself and floated to her next lesson, not noticing she was even moving. Cassiopeia walked into the potions room, she gave a small nod to Snape; he was bit of a slick git in her opinion, but he always gave Cassiopeia good grades and extra house points. Not that she cared about house points, but the rest did and apparently it made up for being so silent. Cassiopeia went and sat next to a girl named Katherine Nott, gave her a small nod, which she returned with a 'Hey,' and went back talking to Helena flipped her hair impatiently, while shooting daggers my way. After she was done with thatHelena continued talking to Katherine, the coward. She didn't insult Cassiopeia, no one did, her blood was too pure, her parents to important, so you just didn't. They were studying Colour Changing Essence, which was a tricky potion to do; unless you have Snape on your side, and in Cassiopeia's case, she did. At the end of the lesson she made a potion that would result an A with a fair teacher, so she probably had an E.


	2. Chapter 2

**I've Changed the whole lay out because it kind of sucked.**

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At dinner Cassiopeia was reading _the evening prophet_, while having spaghetti with garlic bread. Two people from the ministry were discussing how _the_ occurrence could have happened.

_JOHNIFER POSEL AND RECENA GRACE DISCUS;_

**_THE GREAT ESCAPE_**

_The question haunting the whole wizarding community; will it be answered at last?_

_This morning we were all greeted by the news of ten escapees from Azkaban. Shocking everyone around, we have been warned that they would probably rally with escape from two years ago, Sirius Black. _

_Posel; I was frying eggs when the prophet arrived, I didn't really look at the front page till is sat down to have my eggs. Nearly choked on them to, my wife had to thump me in my back! _

_Grace; I know what you mean, my wife broke our best china when she found out, had to go to st. Mungo's because she cut herself so badly._

_Posel; oh Merlin, that's horrible! Is she okay?_

_Grace; don't worry, they had her back up and goi…_

She changed article thinking;_ sweet Merlin is this how low the prophet has sunk. _Another headline took her interest;

**THE ESCAPEES AND THE THREAT MAY THEY CAUSE.**

All ten of them where listed below the headline with a photo and reason for imprisonment. Quickly Cassiopeia searched the page, finding her mother first, it said;

_BELLATRIX BLACK._

_Black, or also known as Lestrange after her husband, is know_

_to be one of the four people to have tortured Frank and Alice (née; _

_Prewett) Longbottom to insanity. Also is she known to have _

_served You-Know-Who loyally, and having a number of unsolved_

_ well published murders on her name. _

Nothing new, she noticed. Just the same old dragon crap as usual, sighing, Cassiopeia started looking for her dad. After reading the first line of his story she noticed it wasn't any better than her mothers, she made a ball out of the paper and through it a side carelessly. Hearing someone say 'ouch,' made her smile. Good, that the useless lump at least hit someone. The only problem was that she didn't have anything to do except, well, eat. On her own, which would be sad, Black or not. Deciding that or she was going to have to get her paper back from the floor, which would be embarrassing, or just having to eat very fast, she chose the latter and started shuffling food inside her mouth at incredibly high speed. After chugging down her glass of pumpkin juice, she didn't even like the stuff, Cassiopeia walked to the common room very slowly not really feeling like reading; _The Pure Life _or _Posy, The House Elf That Got Himself Killed And Other Story's About Wandless Animals _(the latter was a gift from Draco when his house elf got disowned, helps him through he hard period of having to get his own drinks). Then she thought about that paper, and how her mother and father were free and maybe even capable of accepting letters, if not send them back. This gave her hope, maybe; just maybe, she could finally talk to he parents. Feeling more exited and she had felt in a long tine Cassiopeia nearly ran up the stairs to the Owlery. Just as she turned the corner Cassiopeia bumped up into someone, not looking who it was she ran pas him or her thinking about her letter. Wrenching open the door Cassiopeia was greeted with a gust of cold wind and the penetrating smell of owl droppings. She wrinkled her nose and walked over to a window while out of her bag she got a piece of parchment, a quill, a bottle of ink and her wand. Cassiopeia cleaned the windowsill with a quick _scourgify _and went and sat on the cold stone thinking her plan through. She couldn't send a letter to her parents, it would be stupid, and what if someone read it. She still didn't trust that Umbridge woman even if she wasn't that horrible to her. No, Cassiopeia wouldn't write to her parents, maybe to aunt Narcissa, it would be logical that they would be there; I mean they were sisters after all. Glad with her decision Cassiopeia opened her ink bottle, dipped her quill in and wrote,

_Dear aunty Narcissa,_

_I hope you are well. Over here everything's fine, just a bit boring. I was reading the paper this morning and I was wondering about them. Have you heard anything from them? _

_Have a nice day,_

_Sincerely,_

_Your niece, Cassiopeia_ _black._

Blowing on her letter so it would dry faster, she looked over at the school owls. Cassiopeia never, _ever,_ used the school owls; she had no one to write to. Cassiopeia decided that the ink was dry; she picked a simple barn owl. She wrote; _Narcissa Malfoy_ on the outside of the parchment shoved it in the owl's beak and threw it out of the window. Shocked by the harsh treatment it had trouble staying a flight but quickly recovered and flew away at top speed.

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Cassiopeia got an answer at breakfast a week later, Draco, whom just got his own post, gave a little piece of paper to her. On top it said in ruby ink, _Cassiopeia Black,_ the seal that held the piece of paper together was broken. With no expression on her face she looked at Draco, he shrugged, said 'I was curios,' and walked back to his friends with a smirk on his face. She got a peach out of the fruit basket and threw it as hard as she could, which was hard, against Draco Malfoy's head. Shocked, he turned around rubbing his head, looking who had hit him. Then he saw the peach lying on the floor and eminently knew what it meant. Quickly Cassiopeia looked back at her yoghurt; there was a reason why she threw a peach, and not an apple or a pear (which would hurt a lot more). Draco knew that every morning, since she found her parent's whereabouts, she would eat peach yoghurt with fresh piece of peach, no skin. Except on Sunday when Cassiopeia would have croissants with butter and Gouda cheese, it had been like that for years and everybody knew she didn't have any urge to change the habit. Only a few know why she eats it's those foods, and they are smart enough not to tell any one. The habit started on a sunny Tuesday afternoon when she was ten years old, in the Greengrass' garden house.

**FLASHBACK**

'_Mmmmm, strawberries are my most favourite food ever!' A little boy with brown hair squealed on eardrum splitting level._

'_Inside voice Corin,' the voice came from a woman with brown coloured hair in a messy bun and a tiered look on her face. Two girls let out a few giggles, one had the same brown colour hair as her little brother and the other so dark brown it was nearly black. Both were wearing matching dark green dresses and black glossy shoes._

'_Would you like another strawberry dear?' a man asked is his wife, his name was Corvus Greengrass. 'What, what, um, yes,' Mrs. Sulpicia Greengrass answered distracted trying to wipe strawberry juice of the eight year old boy who was munching on his mothers strawberry's happily. 'I prefer _Cauldron Cakes _for me that is the most delicious food ever,' the browner haired girl, Renata, said. 'oh really,' her mother said not really listening, strawberry juice is sticky stuff, but then she processed what her daughter had really said 'Wait, _Cauldron Cakes,_ who has given you _Cauldron Cakes,_' she looked at her husband with a look that said _oh no you didn't _. Renata noticed this 'No Mother, Father didn't give me any. Grandmother Selwyn did, she knows how much I like them,' the girl said quickly bowing her head ashamed._

'_Well, I'm going to have a conversation with my dear mother,' Sulpicia murmured, no one heard her, little Renata was asking what her fathers favourite food was._

'_Lamb stew, my dearest Renata,' he told her knowing. 'Oh,' Renata said, processing the weird answer. 'What about you Cass?' little Corin asked. 'It's Cassiopeia Corin, and I like peaches.' For some reason she blushed deeply at this, but Sulpicia laughed, 'Just as your mother,' she told them, when the children looked puzzled she explained what she meant. 'Your mother loved peaches, every morning she would have peach yoghurt with pieces of fresh peach, no skin. And your father used to eat croissants with Gouda cheese every day. Bella would always wrinkle her nose in disgust, unhealthy, she called it. I and the girls would always laugh whenever that happened,' Sulpicia smiled sadly at the happy memory. Cassiopeia's face was full of thought._

**END FLASHBACK**

Draco tried to throw the peach back but hit a Hufflepuff girl, who turned in her seat looking furious. But when she noticed Draco had thrown the offensive peach, she blushed a lived scarlet and returned to her egg dippy. Cassiopeia gave another snort, the little coward, and returned to her letter. Before she had tome to open it though, someone interrupted her.

'Hi,' a voice said, Cassiopeia looked his way with a guarded look. It was Corin; the little brown haired boy looked at her with a small smile on his lips. Corin was sorted in Slythering, like he should, but is sister, Renata, was in Ravenclaw. It took the Greengrass family a whole year to get over the shock; she wasn't even aloud to come home for Christmas in her first year. Even now, after three years, her parents acted coolly towards her. Corin's friends were used to Cassiopeia presence, in their first year she used to scare them to death. The silent scary girl with rumours circulating around her and her parents, whom everybody is waiting to attack the Longbottom boy just like her parents did. But they understood that if you didn't try to hard she could be remotely pleasant to be around. Now they were friendly towards her and asked her the occasional question if they were bothered. A few she didn't even dislike, like Markus Goyle and Darleen Zabini. They were nice, and pure blood of course, Cassiopeia would rather die a slow painful death than to be seen talking to a Mudblood, or worse, a _muggle._ Cassiopeia gave corin a small smile back and had another try at opening that darn letter, the first line said;

_To my daughter,_

Her hart skipped a beat, she hadn't expected that her mother and father would write back, but apparently they did. Hungry for more she quickly concentrated on the letter again;

_I would like to congratulate you on becoming a Slythering, I'm very proud that you didn't shame our family by becoming a filthy blood traitor. I defiantly had my doubts leaving you with you father's uncle, especially after finding out that his filthy blood traitor of a daughter became a Ravenclaw, but, as I knew you would, you're a real Black. Cissy aloud we to stay at her manor in till the Dark Lord will take over as a shelter. We will collect you together with Draco at the end of the term, and take you to the house form the rest of the holidays._

_Make us proud,_

_Bellatrix Black_


	3. Chapter 3

**The next chapter! nothing more to say then enjoy and REVIEW!.**

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Slowly Cassiopeia opened her eyes; carefully she studied the patterns above her head. Little snakes were spread across the dark green back ground, usually together with flowers or bushes or trees. Slowly she sat up and put her feet on the ground, everybody in her dormitory was still asleep, little rays of sunlight bravely shone through the blanket of clouds. With slow precise movements she stood up and walked and her toes to her dresser trying to only stand on the little snakes. Out of her dresser she got a dark green t-shirt and a pair of black skinny jeans, carefully on her toes she walked to the bathroom. Cassiopeia bolted the door behind her and turned on the shower, stripped of her clothes and let the warm water fall on her black hair.

When she was done with her shower, and smelling like vanilla, Cassiopeia got dressed carefully and applied her make-up. First a line of black _Miss Dearborn Magical Eyeliner, NON SMUDGE! _ A line below her eye with black _Miss Dearborn Magical Köln, NON SMUDGE!_ , and to top it of a layer of mascara. She looked at her reflection in the mirror, Cassiopeia wasn't ugly, but you wouldn't describe her as beautiful either. Striking, might be a better term for her looks, her hair was black with a hint of brown through it; her blue eyes that had a blank quality to them. Her skin was ivory and she had a mole on the left side of her neck. With one hand she touched her mole just like she and Renata used to do, she had a mole on the exact same place. Cassiopeia remembered all the times she and Renata had sat in the window sill of there shared bedroom touching each others necks. She was different then, not just younger but also… happier… more naive. It was before she knew about her parent's whereabouts, before she changed… Slowly, still touching her neck Cassiopeia unlocked the bathroom door and made her way trough the dormitory to the door careful to only stand on the little snakes.

**DPOV.**

_(This will be written in first person.)_

I walked in the great hall together with Crabbe and Goyle flanking my sides; a little Hufflepuff cringed when I glared at her. I felt my trademark smirk sliding in place but didn't pay attention to my prey; I had better things to do.

'Shall we go and sit down Draco,' Pansy asked putting her hand on my elbow.

'Of course,' I said smiling at her; she smiled back and walked to the table with a weird jump in her step. I started walking to the table when I saw my cousin sit on her own a few plates to our left. She was having her standard yoghurt and was reading a book I recognised to be the fourth book in _The Pure Life_ series.

'I'm going to sit with Cass today,' I said over my shoulder to Crabbe, he nodded stupidly and went to sit next to Blaise. Slowly I walked over to where Cass sat engrossed in her book, her eyes would have looked blank to everybody else but I noticed the little hungry glimmer in it. Very slowly, as if not to scare her, I sat down; she didn't even notice and took another spoon of yoghurt. A few seconds past and I came to the conclusion she wasn't going to say anything or acknowledge me in any way.

'Hey,' I tried hoping she would notice me, it worked. Slowly she raised her head, studied me for a few seconds, gave me a small smile as if to say 'I know you're here', and returned to her book taking another spoon full of peach yoghurt. I gave a sigh and pilled scrambled eggs with sausages on my plate, Cass changed another page without looking up. I picked my fork up and studied her again, for me she wasn't Cass any more, my crazy eccentric cousin. She used to be like that, crazy, wild and very present; when we were small she always stayed a few weeks in the summer at our house. She would go crazy, run around the house like a bouncy ball you would get in a Christmas cracker (the ones that change colours every time you bounce it), she would yell and scream and tell complete nonsensical story's about dragons and house elf's (somehow the house elf always ended up eaten by the dragon). Cass would laugh and dance even making my father smile at her randomness, a hard thing to accomplish. I loved her visits; I loved how Crazy Cass could make you laugh even when you were really sad, I loved how she would force our old house elf dobby to play victim in one of her plays inspired on her legendary story's, I loved how every time I saw her her eyes would shine with excitement, I loved her in the same way I love my parents.

But now, she wasn't Cass any more, my crazy cousin, Merlin no, she was Cassiopeia Black daughter of two death eaters and excited to follow in their footsteps. Cassiopeia was a silent girl, dreamy in a mysterious way, you never knew if she actually acknowledges you or if she was just staring into space thinking. She seemed to do that a lot, thinking, just staring into the nothingness mulling things over, or reading, that were her two main activities now days. Cass changed another page shaking me out of my thoughts, suddenly I blurted out; 'Cass, why are you always so quiet.'

Did I really just asked that, am I really that stupid, not that I'm stupid in the first place, no one, I repeat _no one_, asks why Cass is so silent. Its like an unspoken rule, you don't ask her why she's so quiet, she wont make your life a living hell (the girl can do a mean teeth growing curse). Slowly, Cass looked up from her book and looked at me for a few every long seconds, and then she finally answered;

'Because I can,' her eyes wondered back to her book, not satisfied with her answer, and decided that I ruined the whole 'don't make Cassiopeia angry' thing I might try and push the limit as far as I possibly can, I asked; 'But why Cass, I always loved it when you were that crazy girl infecting my house with your randomness every summer.'

For one second I could see a mixture of hurt, happiness, shock and sadness in her eyes, then her face went back to the emotionless mask I had grown accustom to the past couple of years. But for a few seconds, just a few seconds, I had see my Crazy Cass again, for the first time in years I had seen emotion on her face, unless you count that time this summer when mother told me what happened during the third task last summer. I had seen only hunger and lust to prove herself to the Dark Lord, not the emotions she had let her face be inflicted with a minute ago.

'But things have changed since those summers Draco; I didn't know how I was back then and what my purpose was back then either. I can't be part of _them_ if I'm crazy and bubbly; it just isn't like that Draco, I'm sorry.' She stood up grabbed her book and walked away leaving me behind lost for words.

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**I've already got half of the rest chapter but I'm still thinking what I want to say in the chapter... bye.**


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N; I am so sorry for not updating faster, I had bit of a writers block and its still there but I managed to write this down. So Review Alert Favourite or al three!**

**I dedicate this chapter to my cousin Florence Black for having such an amazing name :).**

**btw did you know that when you type Dreuzel (Muggle in dutch) in Google translate it says Muggle! yeah I do ussefull things with my free time...**

**CB.**

She lied; she lied okay, so what if Cassiopeia didn't tell Draco the exact reason for her dramatic personality change, she doesn't own him anything, he should be glad that Cassiopeia didn't curse him in front of the whole school. Aggravated she stormed out of the great hall leaving a stunned Draco behind her, she had no idea where she was going as long as it was as far a way as she could get from Draco Malfoy. Cassiopeia ended up, of all places, at the library, slowly she moved over to the dark arts section that held _The Pure Life_, she had just finished book four, Cassiopeia picked out book five and walked to the worn leather sofa. She opened the book but was still too aggravated to start reading; Cassiopeia let out a huge sigh, closed her eyes and put her head against the back of the sofa feeling the books in the bookcase behind her brush her head. She hated lying to Draco, she always had a soft spot for him and Corin, but telling him her biggest secret was just too much to handle. No one new her secret, barely anyone knew there was a secret, and it wasn't like Cassiopeia was dyeing to tell anyone either. It was the only thing no one knew, the only thing people couldn't tell every little embarrassing detail about. It was her secret, her lie, her mask she was hiding behind for years and no one could take away from her. She let out another big sigh and turned back to her book trying to forget the painful words Draco said to her ten minutes ago. After the first page she lost complete track of the story, his words were twirling in her head; 'Cass, why are you always so quiet.' 'Because I can,' she had told him, it was true, but just 'because she could' wasn't the reason why she didn't say a thing anymore. It wasn't the reason for her change of hart, the 360 in personality change, the silence that followed her now days. Then Cassiopeia heard the padding of feet on the hard wooden floors that were a standard at the library; a girl emerged behind the bookcase that was the line between the charms section and the dark arts section. She looked her age, maybe a year or so younger, when she saw Cassiopeia the girl flushed scarlet and moved over to the bookcase that held the books she was looking for. _A Ravenclaw,_ Cassiopeia thought. Her blue tie was securely tucked into her jumper, the girl's strait dishwater blond hair was pulled into a high pony tail on top of her head secured with a bark blue ribbon. Her fingers slowly glided across the books and occasionally picking one of the bookshelf, after a few minutes of this her pile became pretty high. The Ravenclaw wasn't the strongest and soon she had to put her pile down on one of the assorted tables. Knowing the dark arts section of hart, the books the Ravenclaw picked weren't books for studying or essay's. The pile actually included some of Cassiopeia's favourites like; _What Happens When You Turn Your Back To Pure-Bloods, _and_ The Danger Muggleborns Cause And How They Could Be Avoided_. She couldn't help but wonder why the girl needed them, and then Cassiopeia did something so completely out of character it scarred the Ravenclaw to death.

'Why are you going to read those books,' the girl dropped the book she was holding and looked at Cassiopeia her face full of disbelieves. After a minute the girl seemed to regain her footing and answered with a shaky voice,

'Because I want to see the other side on pure blood supremacy and if I prefer it,' the girl returned to her pile of books, sat down on a chair and started reading the first one. Five minutes past in silence, then the Ravenclaw changed books while letting out a sigh, the book she picked from the pile was called; _Dark Forces And It's Consequences On The Wizarding Population. _

'You don't want to read that,' Cassiopeia called out, the way the girl looked around would make you think that she had pink hair, 'it makes pure blood supremacist seem like the bad ones,' Cassiopeia got up from the sofa she was sitting on and walked to one of the book cases and picked up a small battered book.

'Read that and you'll know all you want to know,' she handed the book to the girl and went to sit on the sofa again.

'I doesn't have a title,' the girl said after a minute, annoyed Cassiopeia putt her book back down and explained, 'It's a diary, someone in Azkaban wrote it, no one knows who,' she walked over to the table, this time with her book and sat across to the girl.

'Apparently it's the original, the person who wrote it didn't write his name scared that someone would find it.'

'Oh, okay,' they went back to reading, she the diary Cassiopeia her book, 'What's your name?' the girl asked, tell or not tell, part of Cassiopeia knew that she was okay, so she answered;

'Cassiopeia Black, Pure Blood,'

'Florence Clayton, Half Blood.'


End file.
